These " bourgeois anti- clerics " are poison to hopes of building a truly MASS movement for socialism. What kind of future " socialist democracy " can be based on some hostile official attitude of making millions of Protestants, Catholics , Muslims and Orthodox Jews second class citizens in need of SCIENTIFIC " re-education " ? Led by some official, humorless " Society of the Godless " ?
The horrendous record of religious intolerance and fanaticism is well documented . But where have smug and fanatical atheists made the world a better place to live ?
If my memory is correct ,I recall a passage in Engel's " Anti-Duhring " where Engels ridicules the German " Herr Professor " for wanting to " out-Bismarck Bismarck " in waging war on the Catholic Church. A lesson : did Nero have the last word on the spread of Christianity ?
How much compassionate social reform was inspired by a religious outlook ? How much great art , music , and literature ?
What GOOD does the New Atheism inspire ?
[ In a popular cartoon of 1875, the French artist and writer Felix Regamey lampooned the powerful Chancellor of Germany, Otto von Bismarck. In the cartoon, the Chancellor tries to pull a rope attached to St. Peter's Basilica and declares to Satan that he intends to destroy the papacy. Satan replies, "I have been trying to do it all my life. If you manage it, I shall give you full marks." ]
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